POLYSYNTHESIS IN THE LANGUAGES OF 
THE AMERICAN INDIANS 


BY 


J. N. B. HEWITT 


(From The American Anthropologist, October, 1893) 


WASHINGTON, D. C. 

JUDI) & DRTWEIUER, PRINTERS 
1893 






b 


[From The; American Anthropologist for October, 1893.] 


POLYSYNTHESIS IN THE LANGUAGES OF THE 
AMERICAN INDIANS. 


BY J. N. B. HEWITT. 


In the early part of this century Peter S. Duponceau announced 
his conviction, obtained from a cursory study of the scanty and 
imperfect linguistic material accessible to him, that the grammatic 
phenomena of the known tongues of the American Indians are 
characterized by a common ground plan, or, adopting a phrase of 
Maupertuis, a “plan of ideas.” This plan he called polysynthetic 
or syntactic , and defined it as follows: 

“A polysynthetic or syntactic construction of language is that in which 
the greatest number of ideas are comprised in the least number of words. 
This is done principally in two ways. 1. By a mode of compounding 
locutions which is not confined to joining two words together, as in 
Greek, or varying the inflection or termination of a radical word, as in 
most European languages, but by interweaving together the most signifi¬ 
cant sounds or syllables of each simple word, so as to form a compound 
that will awaken in the mind at once all the ideas singly expressed by the 
words from which they are taken. 2. By an analogous combination [of] 
the various parts of speech, particularly by means of the verb, so that its 
various forms and inflections will express not only the principal action, 
but the greatest possible number of the moral ideas and physical objects 
connected with it, and will combine itself to the greatest extent with 
those conceptions which are the subject of other parts of speech, and in 
other languages require to be expressed by separate and distinct words. 
Such I take to be the general character of the Indian languages.” * 

He elsewhere says: 

“I am inclined to believe that the.se forms are peculiar to this part of 
the world, and that they do not exist in the languages of the old 
world. ’ ’ *f 

In an essay, which won, in 1833, the Volney prize of the Insti¬ 
tute of France, he says : 

“A l’aide d’inflexions, comme_daus les langues grecque et latiue, de 
particules, affixes et suffixes, coniine dans le copte, l’hebreu et les lan¬ 
gues dites semitiques, de la jonction de particules siguificatives, comme 

* Transactions of the Historical and Literary Committee of the American Philo¬ 
sophical Society, held at Philadelphia, for promoting useful knowledge, vol. i, p. xxx. 
fLoc. cit., p. 370. 




382 


THE AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST. 


[Vol. VI. 


dans le chinois, et enfin de syllabes et souvent de simples lettres inter- 
calees a l’effet de reveiller une idee de l’expression de lacpielle cette 
lettre fait partie, a quoi il faut ajouter l’ellipse, qui fait sousentendre, les 
Indiens de l’Amerique sout parvenus a former des langues qui compren- 
neut le plus grand nombre d’idees dans le plus petit nombre de mots 
possible. Au moyen de ces precedes ils peuveut changer la nature de 
toutes les parties du discours ; du verbe, faire un adverbe ou un uom ; de 
l’adjective ou du substautif, un verbe ; eiffin, tous les auteurs qui out 
ecrit sur ces langues avec connaissauce de cause, depuis le nord jusqu’au 
sud, affirmeut que, dans ces idiomes sauvages, on peut former des mots a 
l’infmi.”* 

If a general principle of the kind here described could be estab¬ 
lished it would be of the utmost importance to the students of com¬ 
parative grammar. This, however, can be done only by a careful 
and thorough analysis by the modern methods of linguistics of every 
language concerned, an analysis which has not yet been made. 
For such an analysis trustworthy and sufficient data must also be at 
hand. 

The lexic and syntactic material relating to these languages is, in 
some instances, quite extensive, consisting mostly of short vocabu¬ 
laries, translations of the Holy Scriptures or portions thereof, and 
more or less pretentious lexicons and grammars; but, for the pur¬ 
pose of comparative or other study, these are so faulty and mislead¬ 
ing and so warped by erroneous theories and misapprehensions that 
they are of small value and of precarious utility in morphologic 
study. The learned Father Cuoq, equally well-versed in Iroquoian 
and Algonquian speech, says : 

“One penser de certaiues traductions des Stes. Ecritures? Ceux qui 
out taut soit peu etudie les differeutes portions de la Bible traduites dans 
les langues indiennes de l’Amerique par les soins de certaiues Societes 
Bibliques, en trouvent la traductioii—il m’est peuible de le dire—vrai- 
ment pitoyable. Ce n’est rien moiiis qu’une profanation de la parole de 
Dieu ; et je suis assure pour ma part que les membres eux-memes de ces 
societes seraient les premiers a repudier leurs pauvres publications et a 
les condamner aux flammes, s’ils counaissaient les incorrections, les in¬ 
exactitudes, les solecismes, les barbarismes, et les contre-sens dont elles 
fourmillent.” f 

Duponceau had no ready means of testing the work of his chief 
authorities, and so was compelled to accept their unsupported state- 

* Memoire sur le syst6me grammatical des langues de quelques nations indiennes de 
l’Am6rique du nord. Paris, 1838, p. 89. 

f“ Jugement erroue de M. Rrnest Renan sur les langues sauvages,” p. 105. 



Oct. 1893.] POLYSYNTHESIS IN INDIAN LANGUAGES. 


383 


ments and deductions. He drew his information of the Iroquoian 
language from the works of Zeisberger and Pyrlaeus, chiefly those 
of the former. A careful and unbiased examination of Zeisberger’s 
work shows that the worthy missionary had at best only a super¬ 
ficial and precarious knowledge of that language, for he lacked the 
very elementary acquaintance with it which would have enabled him 
invariably to distinguish its words from their derivatives and from 
its sentences and phrases. 

The method of inflections, which is common to European and 
other tongues, need not detain us; the method of intercalation or 
interweaving vocal elements claimed to be peculiarly characteristic 
of the polysynthetic scheme demands some consideration. Had it 
a substantial basis of fact it would indeed serve to mark off from 
all others those languages in which it was found to prevail. The 
use of a process so singular and abnormal in its operation can be 
established only by the evidence of unequivocal facts. The data 
adduced as proof that such a method of combining vocal elements 
is one of the most Characteristic traits of all known Indian tongues 
are of the most questionable character. This process is not a part 
of Iroquoian grammar, nor has a satisfactory example of it been 
cited from Algonquian speech, and Rev. J. Owen Dorsey states 
that it does not find a place in the Siouan grammatic processes; 
hence it follows that the languages of these three great stocks are 
not polysynthetic within the meaning of this term as used by Du- 
ponceau, because they do not use the so-called “artificial elements” 
nor the alleged process of “ interweaving together or “ intercala¬ 
tion ” of vocables, which alone constitute the characteristic traits 
of the supposed “polysynthetic construction.” This raises the pre¬ 
sumption that careful study will show that other less-known Indian 
tongues, which, like the three named above, have been classed as 
polysynthetic by Duponceau and his disciples, are not founded on 
that theoretic plan; because wherever the syntactic and morphologic 
processes have been ascertained from accurate and sufficient data they 
have been found at variance with the polysynthetic processes, and 
they likewise differ greatly among themselves in their ground plans. 
It has, in fact, been found that those Indian languages whose lexic 
and syntactic phenomena have been thoroughly analyzed have not, 
as Duponceau maintained, a peculiar construction of language, in 
which “ the greatest number of ideas are comprised in the least 
number of words,” which is the motive or object of his conjectured 
ground plan or “ plan of ideas.” 


384 


THE AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST. 


[Vol. VI. 


Duponceau further says: 

“Les Indieus, surtout ceux qui sont chasseurs et nomades, n’out pus 
uue tete bieu analytique. Ils se sont bientot embrouilles dans la forma¬ 
tion de leurs mots : recevant leurs idees en groupes, ainsi que la nature 
nous les presente, ils out voulu les exprimer a la fois avec toutes leurs 
parties, telles qu’ils les apercevaient.* Ont-ils voulu, par exemple, 
donner un noin a un certain arbre, ils n’out pas pense a le designer sim- 
plemeiit par le fruit, ou par quelque autre apparence unique ; mais ils 
out dit: l'arbre portant tel fruit et dont les feuilles resseniblent a telle 
chose , et ils out clierclie a exprimer tout cela par uu seul mot. Mais 
comment faire? S’ils joignaient tous ces mots ensemble, ils en auraieut 
un nouveau d’uue longueur enorme ; et puis, leur nouvelle laugue, abon- 
dant en consonnes, n’etait pas heureusement formee pour uue pareille 
jonction. Alors ils out pris quelque chose de cliaque mot, et par la 
reunion et Pintercalation des syllables, et metne de sons simples tires de 
la phrase qu’ils avaient choisie, ou plutot des mots incohereus qui la 
preseutaient a leur esprit, ils ont forme un nom propre compose de ces 
differentes parties d’idees ; et pour celles qu’ils u’ont pu y faire eutrer, 
1 ’ellipse est venue a leur secours. * * * Ce qui nous parait le plus 

probable, est que les langues, comme le moude, ont commence par le 
chaos, et ont acquis de la regularity plus tot ou plus tard, sous une forme 
ou une autre, selon le gdnie des peuples, leurs situations ou leurs besoins. 
Celles des Indieus de l’Amerique du nord out retenu beaucoup de ce 
genre cliaotique qui a du presider a leur formation. Les parties du dis¬ 
cours y sont eutremelees d’une maniere qui fait croire qu’elles n’ont pas 
toujours ete soumises aux regies qui les gouveruent actuellement et qui, 
introduces peu a peu, n’ont pu que modifier, sans le detruire, le systeine 
de formation des mots qui parait avoir prevalu des le commencement. 

“ Ce systeme polysynthetique est ce qui caracterise les langues algon- 
quines, ainsi que toutes celles de l’Amerique, et influe uecessairement 
sur leurs formes grammaticales, qui lie different que dans les details.” 

To this he adds the following foot-note: 

“ La plus forte preuve qu’on puisse donner du melange d’idees qui a 
existe au temps de la formation de ces langues, est le nombre de mots 
qu’elles out pour exprimer la me me chose, selon les circonstances qui 
l’accompagnent. II y a un verbe pour dire ‘ j’ai envie de manger de la 
viaude,’ et un autre pour ‘j’ai envie de manger de la soupe ou de la 
bouillie ; ’ un mot, pour une plaie faite avec un instrument tranchaut; 
un autre, pour une plaie faite avec un instrument contondaut; ces lan¬ 
gues geueraliseiit rarement.” t 

In support of these striking statements Duponceau has produced 
no trustworthy proofs. He has adduced only the most fanciful 

*Tliis is iu substance the doctrine of holophrasis, to which attention will be given 
hereafter. 

f Memoire, pp. 118-120. 



Oct. 1893 .] POLYSYNTHESIS IN INDIAN LANGUAGES. 385 

reasons to support his conviction that the Indian languages still 
preserve the “ chaotic style” which “seems to have prevailed from 
the beginning.” The intermixture of the parts of speech does not 
follow from the fact that a language can in a word-sentence say, 
“ I desire meat,” or “ I desire soup,” and can distinguish between 
a “cut” and a “bruise.” Such word-sentences are governed by 
certain fixed laws of position and sequence of stems. 

The usual method of obtaining a vocabulary from an unlettered 
people is largely responsible for the doctrine that Indians rarely 
generalize. A savage is asked, How do you say “I eat meat,” or 
“I drink soup?” and, if he understands the question, he replies 
by the appropriate sentences (not words, as many think), meaning, 
in his own vernacular, “ I eat meat,” or “ I drink soup.” He can 
distinguish between a cut and a bruise , and shows it by his language, 
but must it be inferred from this that he cannot generalize, or that 
he does it but rarely? 

The materials of the language of the Iroquois consist of notional 
words, namely, nouns, verbs, and adjectives; representative words, 
namely, prefixive and independent pronouns; relational words, 
adverbs, conjunctions, and suffixive prepositions; and derivative 
elements, namely, formatives and flexions. 

The distinctive nature and characteristic functions of these ele¬ 
ments cannot be changed at will by any speaker, for the good and 
sufficient reason that a language does and can do only what it is in 
the habit of doing. In the category of notional words, the class of 
elements called noun-stems may not indifferently assume the func¬ 
tions and the flexions peculiar to either the verb-stems or the ad¬ 
jective-stems, neither can the verb-stems nor the adjective-stems 
indifferently assume the functions and the flexions peculiar to either 
of the other two classes of elements in that category; hence Du- 
ponceau’s sweeping statement concerning the general character of 
the American Indian languages, that “they can change the nature 
of all parts of speech; of the verb, make an adverb or a noun; of 
the adjective or substantive, a verb,” is not true of the Iroquoian 
tongue. The elements of its lexicon have acquired their individual 
values by virtue of a series of historical changes, and they severally 
retain these values solely at the behest of conventional usage, being 
subject at all times to further mutations of form and signification as 
this usage may decree. 

The stems of words and word-sentences are not divided for any 


50 


386 


THE AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST. 


[Vol. VI. 


purpose whatever. The compound stems of word-sentences may, 
by historical changes, become parts of speech—notional terms— 
denotive of the things described by the word-sentences from which 
they are derived, and they can be so considered only when the lin¬ 
guistic sense has come to disregard the separate meanings of the 
elements thus combined. This is parasynthesis* A prolific source 
of much error concerning the nature of the grammatic processes 
prevailing in this language is the fact that these word-sentences are 
mistaken for words, for a word-sentence must, it is repeated, undergo 
certain historical changes of form and function before it becomes a 
word—a part of speech. Conventional usage alone is the arbiter 
in this, as it is in all things linguistic. 

To exemplify this the following concise analysis of the stems of a 
verb and a noun is given. The verb-stem selected is -he n s-ye n , from 
the word-sentence ru-he n s’ -ye n , “ he hears, understands (by hear¬ 
ing),” and the noun stem is - thetc-hra-kwe , from ut-hetc-hra!-kwe , 
“ a chair, seat.” These two stems have been chosen solely for the 
reason that their constitutive elements have not yet undergone that 
degree of effacement which would render them quite irrecognizable 
to any but an accomplished master of the language. 

The full and original form of ut-hetc-hra!-kwe was ut-hetc-Ki- 
hrd'-kwe , which was evidently derived from the word-sentence 
ye^t-hetc-lu-hrct-khwa!, “ one (some one) uses it to support his but¬ 
tocks,” in which the pronominal element is ye n t- (which is the re¬ 
flexive form of -yd-, “one or she ”), meaning “ one-his ” or “she- 
her,” the reflexive performing a possessive and not a reflexive office ; 
the noun-stem is -. hetc-Ju , from u-hetc'-he , “buttocks, fundament,” 
and, lastly, the verb -hqra-khwa\ “ to support with,” “to use for 
supporting,” or “to use to support.” This verb-stem is from the 
word-sentence ra-hqrd!-khwa!, “he uses it for supporting (it)” or 
“he supports it with (it),” in which the “it” enclosed in paren¬ 
thesis is understood. These two notional stems, -hetc-he (funda¬ 
ment) and -hqrd-khwc! (to support with, use to support), then form 
the compound stem of the word, tit-hetc-hqra!-kwe , “ chair, stool; ” 
but both stems themselves may be still further reduced to show 
the original ideas which combined to form them. The verb-stem 
chosen is -he n -sye n , from the simple sentence ru-he^-sye n , “ he hears 
it,” or simply, “he hears, understands (by hearing).” The com- 


The formation and derivation of a word from a compound. 





Oct. 1893.] POLYSYNTPIESIS IN INDIAN LANGUAGES. 387 

ponents of this stem are -he n s- and -ye n ; -he n s- is the stem of the 
archaic u-he^-se, “ the ear,” and -ye* is the verb “ to enter ” of the 
sentence ra'-ye n , “he enters.” Hence, “to hear” is made up of 
the ideas “ to enter-ear,” but before these two notions could be 
rendered by “hear” usage had to disregard their several and sepa¬ 
rate meanings. Moreover, the stem -hqra-khwat f meaning as a 
morphologic unit, “ to support with,” “ to use for supporting,” or 
“ to use to support,” is in its more literal meaning itself the result, 
of the forgetting of the etymologic elements of a compound. It is 
made up of the stems - heqr , from ra'-heqr , “ he puts (it) upon,” and 
the auxiliary -khwa' , “to do, make,” hence, “to use,” the object 
of the auxiliary being always “ it ” understood, its object being of 
course indicated by the context. 

The pronominal elements prefixed to the stems of words and 
word-sentences perform one of two offices: first, they may be pre¬ 
fixed to noun-stems for the purpose of indicating gender or posses¬ 
sion ; and, second, they may name determinatively the things of 
which it is required that notional stems be made names or predicates. 

In Iroquoian speech all the developments of the language ex¬ 
pressed by the terms word-sentence, stem-formation, and inflection, 
are based primarily on the well-known principle of juxtaposition 
and a more or less intimate fusion of elements, but the living and 
traditional usage of the language has established the following mor- 
phothetic* canons, which determine the nature and the relative posi¬ 
tion or sequence of elements that may be combined into words, 
phrases, and word-sentences, namely : 

First. The simple or compound stem of a notional word or of a 
word-sentence may not be employed isolatedly without a prefixed 
simple or complex personal pronoun or a gender sign or flexion. 

Second. Only two notional stems may be combined in the same 
word-sentence, and they must not be of the same part of speech. 

Third. The stem of a verb or adjective may be combined with 
the stem of a noun, and the stem of the verb or adjective must be 
placed after and never before the noun-stem. 

Fourth. An adjective-stem may not be combined with a verb- 

* 

stem, but it may unite with the formative auxiliary -thai , to cause or 
make , and with the inchoative -f. 

* From morphothesis, the principle or law fixing not only the sequence but also 
determining the kind and number of elements which may be embodied in a word- 
sentence, and also the morphology thus established. 





388 


THE AME11ICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST. 


[Vol. VI. 


Fifth. A qualificative or other word or element may not be inter¬ 
posed between the two combined stems of notional words, nor be¬ 
tween the simple or compound notional stem and its simple or 
complex pronominal prefix, derivative and formative change being 
effected only by prefixing or suffixing suitable flexions and forma- 
tives to the forms fixed by the foregoing canons. 

The following formulas, with examples, chiefly from the Mohawk 
and Onondaga dialects, will show the application of the preceding 
canons in the building of words and word-sentences: 


Simple 

(I.) Pronoun -f verb-stem. 

In the following examples the 
from the stem by a hyphen, 
ka'-riks, it bites (it) ; 
yo'-riks, it bites it; 
ye'-riks, she bites (it) ; 
ra'-riks, he bites (it) ; 

shako'-ryos, he kills them; 


Words. 

pronominal element is separated 

ka'-ke n , it sees (it); 
yo'-ke a , it sees it ; 
ye'-ke n , she sees (it) ; 
shako'-ke n , he sees them ; 

ra'-ya’ks, he breaks, cuts it. 


The final “s” in some of the examples is the sign of customary 
action and not a part of the verb-stem. 


(II.) Pronoun -f noun-stem. 

In these examples the hyphen divides the pronominal element 
from the notional stem. 


o-no n/ sa’, or 

ka-no n 'sa’, a house; house; 
o-ro n/ hya’, or 
ka-ro n 'hya’, sky, the sky; 
o-qsi ,/ ta’, a foot, the foot; 


o-ko n 'sa’, or 

ka-ko n 'sa’, a face or mask; 
o-ron'ta’, or 

ka-ron'ta’, a tree or log ; 
o-hne'ka’, water; liquid. 


(III.) Pronoun -J- adjective-stem. 

In these examples the hyphen separates the pronominal element 
from the stem. 

ka-hon’ / tci, it is black; ka-no'ro“’, it is costly, dear; 

scarce; deplorable ; 

wa-katc'te’, it is durable, lasting; (w)a'-se’, it is new; green ; 

iw'-es, it is long; (w)a-ka'yon’, it is old, ancient; 

w-i'yo, it is fine, beautiful; (y)o-ya / ne’, it is good; proper. 


Oct. 1893 .] POLYSYNTHESIS IN INDIAN LANGUAGES. 


389 


Compound Notional Stems. 

(IV.) Pronoun + noun-stem + verb-stem. 

In the following examples the pronominal, nominal, and verbal 
elements are separated one from another by hyphens. 

ra-ront'-ya’ks, he cuts, breaks, ra-noV-enti, he is building a 
the tree or log ; house; 

ra-hy-uskwas, he plucks fruit; ye-the’tcr-onnis, she makes flour; 
ka-heq’na-neVkwas, it poaches wa-skwi'-ya’ks, it crosses the 
on the field ; bridge; 

ye-’vvahri'-saks, she seeks meat; ye-no n kwa’tcra-yenteri, she un¬ 
is looking for meat; derstands medicine. 

(V.) Pronoun -f- noun-stem -f- adjective-stem. 

The hyphen is used in the following examples as it has been in 
those under preceding formulas, to separate the elements of the 
compound or word-sentence. 

wa-hya'-ksen, (it) fruit is bad ; wa-hya-he n s'tci, (it) fruit is black; 
ka-ne n sa'kwast, (it) house is good ; yo-qsa'-hni-ro n , its foot is firm; 
yu-heq na-kwast, its crop (field) yu-qsa'-ksen, its foot is bad. 
is good; 

ka-noV-iyo, (it) house is large ; 

The pronoun it enclosed by parentheses is a gender sign only 
or is understood. Being definitive, it may often be rendered by 
“the." 

These morphothetic rules establish and govern the morphology 
or ground-plan of Iroquoian words and word-sentences, and any 
violation of these rules by a speaker in forming combinations of 
vocal elements necessarily produces a meaningless assemblage of 
articulate sounds. For instance, to combine two nouns,two verbs, 
or two adjectives in the same compound would not constitute the 
one noun, verb, or adjective a predicate or qualifier of the other 
member of the combination. 

In speaking of what he is pleased to call the original structure of 
the American Indian tongues and of the numerous novel forms with 
which he claims they abound, Duponceau says: 

“ It is impossible to resist the impression which forces itself upon us, 
that we are among the aboriginal inhabitants of a New World. We find 


390 


THE AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST. 


[Vol. VI. 


a new manner of compounding words from various roots, so as to strike 
the mind at once with a whole mass of ideas ; a new manner of express¬ 
ing the cases of substantives, by inflecting the verbs which govern them ; 
a new number (the particular plural) applied to the declension of nouns 
and conjugation of verbs ; a new concordance in tense of the conjunction 
with the verb. We see not only pronouns, as in the Hebrew and some 
other languages, but adjectives, conjunctions, and adverbs combined with 
the principal part of speech and producing an immense variety of verbal 
forms.” * 

This alleged new manner of compounding words, the so-called 
polysynthetic scheme, has already been shown to be erroneous and 
unfounded in fact, since the morphologic processes of those Indian 
languages which have been critically analyzed do not correspond or 
accord with the theoretical processes distinctive of the scheme, nor 
do the morphologic processes prevailing in one tongue accord with 
those common to another in so marked a degree as to warrant the 
inference that they are based on a common principle or ground- 
plan differing essentially from fundamental principles common to 
languages of the old hemisphere. Concerning the new manner of 
expressing the cases of nouns by inflecting the verbs which govern 
them, it may be said that it is not true of the Iroquoian tongue; 
besides, such a process would imply that there exists a provision for 
what is still undeveloped and non-existent in many of the Indian 
languages—a nominal case-ending; the fact being, in most in¬ 
stances, that the noun is in apposition with an objective pronoun 
forming an integral part of the person-endings of the verb ; by this 
means the relation of the noun to the action of the verb is indicated. 
In other instances the position of a noun in a word-sentence de¬ 
termines its “case;” in others it is determined by the pronoun 
with which it is in apposition. In regard to a new number, the 
particular plural, it will suffice to say that it is both Asiatic and 
European, and to that extent not a distinctive trait of the American 
Indian languages. It is thus evident.that this array of new methods 
and novel means is the product of misapprehension and insufficient 
investigation. Duponceau’s fundamental error lay in the fact that 
he attempted to classify all known Indian tongues under a hypotheti¬ 
cal system based chiefly on a superficial study of Algonquian 
morphologies, before he had made a thorough investigation of the 
morphologies of the other Indian tongues involved. His whole 


* Transactions, p. xxxviii. 







Oct. 1893 .] POLYSYNTHESIS IN INDIAN LANGUAGES. 391 

conception of language was erroneous. For instance, speaking of 
Indian speech, he says : 

“ L’organisation interieure du mot est a la discretion de l’inventeur. 
S’il a des regies a suivre, ce sont des regies de gout et 11011 de grammaire. 
Presqu’ entiereineut, c’est l’oreille qui en decide ; les cliangemens et 
transpositions de syllabes et de sons restent a sa disposition, coniine les 
inversions des mots de la langue latine sont a celle de l’homme qui parle 
ou £crit dans cet idiome.” * 

No critical linguistic student could consistently hold such views 
of language and its processes. This statement, besides, is scarcely 
in accord with what he had previously remarked in his Report, where 
he says: 

“Nor can this class of languages be divested, even in imagination, of 
the admirable order, method and regularity, which pervade them ; for it 
is evident that without these, such complicated forms of language could 
not subsist, and the confusion which would follow would render them 
unfit even for the communication of the most simple ideas. A simple 
language may be, perhaps, unmethodical; but one which is highly com¬ 
plicated, and in which the parts of speech are to a considerable degree 
interwoven with each other, I humbly conceive, never can.” | 

The former of these assertions, making the interior form of a word 
the plaything of the caprice of every speaker’s whim and fancy, 
represents his opinion after more than ten years’ study of the lan¬ 
guages, and the latter after not more than three, showing that the 
longer he studied, the less clearly did he comprehend them. Many 
students have adopted the term polysynthetic as a designation of the 
Indian languages, but, apparently, without taking the precaution to 
learn the exact sense in which Duponceau himself employed it, or 
to ascertain whether such a scheme of classification was warranted 
by the grammatic facts of these languages. In explanation of his 
use of it he says that the Indian languages belong to “the class 
which I have denominated polysynthetic merely for the sake of desig¬ 
nation and without meaning to affix any other importance to the 
name.” f 

It thus appears that he employed the term without direct refer¬ 
ence to its etymologic meaning and merely as a tag or label for a 
theoretic scheme of classification, which he believed epitomized the 




* M6moire, p. 145. 
fOp. eit., p. xxvii. 
jOp. cit., p. xxxvi. 




392 


THE AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST. 


[Vol. VI. 


fundamental principles of morphology underlying the structures of 
the American Indian languages. It should be discarded, since its 
further use only perpetuates his errors. 

In an essay, entitled “Polysynthesis and Incorporation as Char¬ 
acteristics of American Languages,” Dr. D. G Brinton attempts 
to show that F. Muller, L. Adam, and others fail to comprehend 
what he himself believes to be Duponceau’s conception of a “poly¬ 
synthetic construction of language.” He says: 

“I believe that for the scientific study of language, and especially of 
American languages, it will be profitable to restore and clearly to differ¬ 
entiate the distinction between polysynthesis and incorporation, dimly 
perceived by Duponceau and expressed by him in the words already 
quoted. With these may be retained the neologism of Lieber, holo- 
phrasis , and the three defined as follows : 

“Polysynthesis is a method of word-building, applicable either to liom- 
inals or verbals, which not only employs juxtaposition with apliseresis, 
syncope, apocope, etc., but also words, forms of words and significant 
phonetic elements which have no separate existence apart from such 
compounds. This latter peculiarity marks it off altogether from the 
processes of agglutination and collocation. 

“Incorporation ( Einverleibung) is a structural process confined to 
verbals, by which the nominal or pronominal elements of the proposi¬ 
tion are subordinated to the verbal elements, either in form or position ; 
in the former case having no independent existence in the language in 
the form required by the verb, and in the latter case being included 
within the specific verbal signs of tense and mood. In a fully incorpo- 
rative language the verbal exhausts the syntax of the grammar, all 
other parts of speech remaining in isolation and without structural con¬ 
nection. 

“Holophrasis does not refer to structural peculiarities of language, but 
to the psychological impulse which lies at the root of polysynthesis and 
incorporation. It is the same in both instances—the effort to express 
the whole proposition in one word. This in turn is instigated by the 
stronger stimulus which the imagination receives from an idea conveyed 
in one word rather than in many.” * * * 

“As the holophrastic method makes no provision for the syntax of the 
sentence outside of the expression of action (z. <?., the verbal and what it 
embraces), nouns and adjectives are not declined. The ‘cases’ which 
appear in many grammars of American languages, are usually indications 
of space or direction, or of possession, and not case-endings in the sense 
of Aryan grammar. 

“A further consequence of the same method is the absence of true rela¬ 
tive pronouns, of copulative conjunctions, and generally of the machinery 
of dependent clauses.” 


Oct. 1893.] POLYSYNTHESIS IN INDIAN LANGUAGES. 303 

All this doubtless has a certain plausibility so long as it is tested 
solely by the faulty and equivocal works of the pioneers in Ameri¬ 
can Indian philology; but, by the light of the facts of language 
which are gradually being made available, these polysynthetic 
dogmas are being dissipated. 

Dr. Brinton’s definition of polysynthesis is clearly defective and 
incomplete. There is an omission of the name or names of the 
elements subject to “juxtaposition,” and also of the term co-ordi¬ 
nate with “juxtaposition” and expressive of a process contrary or 
co-relative to that of “juxtaposition,” two very important omissions 
in a definition designed to “ clearly differentiate the distinction be¬ 
tween polysynthesis and incorporation, dimly perceived by Dupon- 
ceau.” But, as Dr. Brin ton was merely recasting and remoulding the 
first section of Duponceau’s definition of a polysynthetic construction 
of language, the omitted process, judging from this fact and from 
other parts of Dr. Brinton’s essay, is that affirmed by Duponceau 
to consist in the “intercalation” or “ interweaving together the 
most significant sounds or syllables of each simple word ” and the 
various “parts of speech, particularly by means of the verb.” 
The alleged process of intercalation or interweaving together of 
vocal elements has already been shown to be mere hypothesis and 
unfounded in the known facts of Indian languages. Moreover, 
Dr. Brinton tells us that agglutination and collocation differ from 
polysynthesis in not using “words, forms of words and significant 
phonetic elements which have no separate existence apart from 
such compounds.” If this statement were substantiated by facts, it 
would pass unchallenged; but it is to be doubted that “agglutina¬ 
tion and collocation ” do not employ, in the polysynthetic sense, 
“words, forms of words,” which have no existence outside of 
compound forms. Even in the English, which is agglutinative in 
some of its forms, such nouns as sooth and wise are practically 
obsolete in current speech, although in use in compound forms; 
hence, must it be inferred that they never had an independent 
existence in the language? Not at all. In the obsolescence of 
words and forms they will maintain an existence in certain quaint 
or striking phrases or compounds when they have lost their adapta¬ 
bility for current and new formations. 

It may be stated that “significant phonetic elements ” form no 
part of the linguistic material of Indian languages any more than 
they do of that of the Indo-European languages. Words and sounds 
5i 


394 


THE AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST. 


[Vol. VI. 


in Indian as in other languages have no intrinsic signification apart 
from that imposed on them by the common usage of the com¬ 
munity. 

The apparent abbreviation of nouns in derivative words and word- 
sentences which has given rise to some of these misleading designa¬ 
tions may be explained by the fact that those who attempted to 
define the methods of derivation and combination of vocal elements 
took noun-stems from prepositional and other phrases or from word- 
sentences wherein those students have perchance found the stem for 
which they sought, overlooking the fact that language does not 
make decomposition an antecedent condition to other composition. 
Again, in some languages the gender-sign is usually discarded from 
the noun-stem when the stem is united with another to form a new 
compound. 

From Dr. Brinton’s definition of incorporation—the process of 
intercalation or interweaving together of Duponceau—it follows that 
where no conscious or artificial mutilation of notional stems takes 
place in the compound there is no subordination, and so to that 
extent no incorporation ; that where no modal or tensal flexions 
are affixed to the word-sentence in such manner as to give the pro¬ 
nominal and nominal elements—the person-endings and the noun¬ 
stems—the appearance of being infixed or enclosed between those 
elements and the verb stem, there is likewise no incorporation. 
These changes are not made in the simple tenses of the Iroquoian 
indicative mode, showing that the combination of the notional 
stems is a condition antecedent to the affixion of modal and tensal 
flexions to the word-sentence. The fatal error of this doctrine of 
incorporation lies in the fact that it places flexions and formatives 
on an equality with notional stems in the expression of thought, 
making flexions and formatives an integral part of the semasiologic 
difference between two expressions or word-sentences composed of 
unlike notional stems, for it is not the flexions but the notional 
stems which, from the standpoint of morphology, give to every 
word-sentence its semasiologic individuality. So that testing the 
question by Dr. Brinton’s definition of what constitutes incorpora¬ 
tion as he conceives it was dimly perceived by Duponceau, there is 
in the ground-forms ofTroquoian words and word-sentences no trace 
of incorporation; for it is not a question of the affixion or suffixion 
of elements to a root or stem, but merely the use of a system for 
that purpose. 


Oct. 1893.] POLYSYNTHESIS IN INDIAN LANGUAGES. 


395 


The statement that the word-sentence exhausts the syntax of the 
language in which the principle of incorporation prevails, that “ no 
provisions for the syntax of the sentence outside of the expression 
of action (J. e., the verbal and what it embraces)” are made, is 
unwarranted so far as the Iroquoian, Siouan, Athapascan, and 
Algonquian languages are concerned. The employment by these 
languagesof correlatives, relative and coordinate pronouns and con¬ 
junctions, and prepositional phrases is ample refutation of such 
claim. Facts like these show on what an unsubstantial basis was 
erected the hypothetical polysynthetic scheme of Duponceau and 
his followers. 

Dr. Brinton affirms that incorporation consists in .subordinating 
the nominal and pronominal elements of the proposition to the 
verbal in one of two ways: first, by a mutilation of form, and, 
second, by position. In the first case the noun or pronoun must 
assume a form which it does not have apart from such compounds, 
and in the second it must be placed between the signs of mode and 
tense on the one hand and the verb-stem on the other. In Sanscrit, 
an Indo-European language, the person-endings which are admit¬ 
tedly pronominal in origin do not have the form of the pronouns 
when apart from the compounds to which they are affixed. More¬ 
over, they may be inserted between the verb and its adverbial 
qualifiers in the proposition. 

In section 249 of his Sanscrit Grammar Prof. Max Muller says: 

“The comparative is formed by tara or iyas; the superlative by tama 
or ishtha. These terminations, tara and tama , are not restricted in 
Sanscrit to adjectives. Substantives, such as nri, man, form nritamah , 
a thorough man; slri, woman, stritara, more of a woman. Even after 
case-terminations or personal-terminations tara and tama may be used ; 
thus from purvahne> in the forenoon * purvahnetare , earlier in the fore¬ 
noon (Pan., vi,’3, 17); from pachati , he cooks; pachatitaram , he cooks 
better (Pan., v, 3, 57); pachatitamam , he cooks best (Pan., v, 3, 56).” 

Here the pronominal elements, the person-terminations, and 
even the case-endings are inserted (to use the language of polysyn¬ 
thesis) between the notional stem and its adjectival and adverbial 
adjuncts. This is within the purview of Dr. Brinton’s definition of 
incorporation, the subordination of the pronominal elements both 
in form and in position surpassed by nothing from American lan¬ 
guages. Is, therefore, the Sanscrit based on a model common to 
the aboriginal American tongues? If modern instances of this 


396 


T1IE AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST. 


[Vol. VI. 


“incorporation” and the synthetic capacity for compounding 
words be necessary, let us turn to the abundantly synthetic structure 
of modern Russian, which exemplifies the important fact that in 
the Indo-European family, of which the Russian is a member, the 
tendency has not been “everywhere and in all respects downward, 
toward poverty of synthetic forms, throughout the historic period.” 
Of the structure of this language Prof. W. D. Whitney says: 

“The Russian of the present day possesses in some respects a capacity 
of synthetic development hardly, if at all, excelled by that of any 
ancient tongue. For example, it takes the two independent words bez 
Boga , ‘without God,’ and fuses them into a theme from which it draws 
a whole list of derivatives. Thus, first, by adding an adjective suffix, it 
gets the adjective bezbozhnui , ‘godless ; ’ a new suffix appended to this 
makes a noun, bezbozhnik , ‘a godless person, an atheist;' the noun 
gives birth to a denominative verb, bezbozhnichat , ‘to be an atheist;’ 
from this verb, again, come a number of derivatives, giving to the 
verbal idea the form of adjective, agent, act, and so on : the abstract is 
bezbozhnichestvo , ‘ the condition of being an atheist; ’ while, once more, 
a new verb is made from this abstract, namely bezbozhnichestvovat , 
literally ‘to be in the condition of being a godless person.’ A more 
intricate synthetic form than this could not easily be found in Greek) 
Latin, or Sanscrit; but it is no rare or exceptional case in the language 
from which we have extracted it; it rather represents, by a striking 
instance, the general character of Russian word-formation and deriva¬ 
tion.” * 

This, Professor Whitney holds, shows, the futility of attempting 
to maintain that there has been “ an uninterrupted and universal 
reduction of the resources of synthetic expression among the lan¬ 
guages of the Indo-European family,” demonstrating conclusively 
that even the members of a linguistic family differ in synthetic 
capacity. 

These examples of the synthetic power in the Sanscrit and Rus¬ 
sian languages show that the synthesis of a large number of elements 
into the form of a word is not a trait peculiar to the Indian lan¬ 
guages; Duponceau and his followers maintain not only that this 
exuberant synthetic capacity prevails in all known Indian tongues, 
but also that all these synthetic forms are based on one common 
model distinctively peculiar to these aboriginal languages; but, if 
Dr. Brin ton’s definition of what constitutes incorporation be ac¬ 
cepted, then the Sanscrit and the Russian may be confidently said 


* Language and the Study of Language, p. 281. 




Oct. 1893.] POLYSYNTHESIS IN INDIAN LANGUAGES. 


397 


to form their words and word-sentences on the theoretic ground- 
plan conjectured to be the pattern of all the grammatic structures 
of the American Indian tongues. 

Can it, therefore, be asserted that the Sanscrit, the Russian, and 
their congeners belong to a family of languages based on a model 
common to that of the American Indians? As there is no ground- 
plan common to all the well-known Indian tongues, such an assertion 
cannot well be made. They, like the languages of the old hemis¬ 
phere, have traits which are found in the majority of languages and 
they also individually have others which are idiomatic. 

Again, Dr. Brinton says: 

“As the effort to speak in sentences rather than in words entails a con¬ 
stant variation in these sentence-words, there arises both an enormous in¬ 
crease in verbal forms and a multiplication of expressions for ideas closely 
allied. This is the cause of the apparently endless conjugations of many 
such tongues, and also of the exuberance of their vocabularies in words 
of closely similar signification. * * * Languages structurally at the 
bottom of the scale have an enormous and useless excess of words. 
The savage tribes of the plains will call a color by three or four different 
words, as it appears on different objects. The Eskimo has about twenty 
words for fishing, depending on the nature of the fish pursued. All this 
arises from the ‘ holophrastic ’ plan of thought.” 

But Dr. Brinton does not show this by the convincing method of 
citing unequivocal facts of language. He evidently overlooks the 
impossibility of speaking in worths without the use of sentences. 
What evidence has he adduced to prove that the structure of any 
one Indian tongue is the product of an “ effort” to speak in some 
specific manner. The truth of the matter is that the speakers of 
Indian languages are just as powerless consciously to change the 
habits of their several idioms as are the speakers of Indo-European 
and other tongues. 

The statement that certain Indian tongues call a color by three 
or four different names as it appears on different objects is due to 
erroneous information. The explanation of this difficulty is this: 
the three or four different names or words are not names of only 
one color, but rather of as many colors, or, strictly, as many shades 
of the same color as have received appellations in the language in 
question. In the English, one says “a gray horse,” but ‘‘a dun 
cow;” “ a bay horse,” but “a red apple; ” “ a yellow dog,” but 
“ a hazel eye,” etc. 


398 


THE AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST. 


[Vol. VI. 


The other remark, stating that the Eskimo possesses twenty words 
for fishing, “dependent on the nature of the fish pursued,” is to be 
explained in a similar manner, because it is obvious that the different 
means and methods of fishing necessarily require different words for 
their designation. In like manner the Missionary Butrick, who 
preceded Jarvis and Pickering, stated that the language of the 
Cherokees, owing to its incapacity for generalization, has fourteen 
verbs to denote washing different things, but no verb to denote 
washing in general. An analyzation of the fourteen examples given 
shows that they are not all verbs denotive of washing; some signify 
“to swim,” others “ to soak,” others “ to wet or sprinkle,” and 
still others “ to boil,” which, of course, it would be folly to classify 
among the verbs meaning to wash or lave. Thus, a rational expla¬ 
nation is supplied for what appeared to be an anomaly in language. 

In speaking of the elements used in polysynthesis and incorpora¬ 
tion Dr. Brinton says (op. cit .) : 

“As polysynthetic elements we have the inseparable possessive pro¬ 
nouns which in many languages are attached to the names of the parts 
of the body and to the words for near relatives ; alsp the ‘generic forma- 
tives,’ particles which are prefixed, suffixed, or inserted to indicate to 
what class or material objects belong ; also the ‘numeral terminations’ 
affixed to the ordinal numbers to indicate the nature of the objects 
counted; the negative, diminutive, and amplificative particles which 
convey certain conceptions of a general character, * * * but are 

generally not words themselves, having no independent status in the 
language. They may be single letters or even merely vowel-changes 
and consonantal substitutions, but they have well-defined significance.” 

Again (op. cit.), he says : 

“Although in polysynthesis we speak of prefixes, suffixes, and juxta¬ 
position, we are not to understand these terms as the same as in connec¬ 
tion with the Aryan or with the agglutinative languages. In polysyn¬ 
thetic tongues they are not intended to form words, but sentences ; not 
to express an idea, but a proposition. This is a fundamental, logical dis¬ 
tinction between the two classes of languages.” 

In Iroquoian and Algonquian speech the names of the parts of 
the body are not inseparably connected with “ possessive pro¬ 
nouns,” nor do they employ “numeral terminations” to indicate 
the “nature of the objects counted.” Dr. Brinton endeavors to 
make a distinction between “prefixes, suffixes, and juxtaposition,” 
when used in reference to Aryan and agglutinative languages and 
when they refer to flexions in Indian languages, on the erroneous 


399 


Oct. 1893.] POLYSYNTHESIS IN INDIAN LANGUAGES. 

ground that in polysynthetic tongues their function is “ not to 
form words, but sentences; not to express an idea, but a proposi¬ 
tion.” A more misleading statement or a more lamentable confu¬ 
sion of terms regarding the function and use of flexions in language 
it would be difficult to equal. There is nothing in the use and 
historical development of flexional and formative elements in those 
Indian languages which have been thoroughly studied by the scien¬ 
tific methods of modern linguistics to warrant the assumption that 
formatives and flexions are employed solely for the purpose of form¬ 
ing sentences, and that they do not compose essential parts of 
words. Such a contention can rest solely on the tremendous as¬ 
sumption that every Indian necessarily knows the etymology—the 
component parts or constitutive elements—of each word he employs. 
The science of language stands opposed to such fanciful assump¬ 
tions. Moreover, this is another proof, if such be needed, that the 
' doctrine of polysynthesis rests on a fundamental misconception of 
the phenomena of linguistic growth and development, for its 
methods and means of linguistic growth do not conform to those 
established by the science of language. In a science so well con¬ 
stituted as is that of comparative linguistics, groundless assumptions 
should be avoided. In a science of this character, research to be 
fruitful of substantial and trustworthy results must converge toward 
a self-sustaining and continuous development. The findings of 
to-day must enlarge without overturning the conceptions of yes¬ 
terday, and thenceforward there must be “ system, but no systems; ” 
facts and reasons must take the place of authorities. But, in the 
fruitful field of American Indian linguistics, there appears to be no 
common method or system of study, and for this reason every 
important question pertaining to these tongues is in dispute, with 
no recognized criterion by which the accuracy and trustworthiness 
of any result, system, or conclusion may be tested. This is the 
soil in which controversy flourishes. It is too much the custom to 
quote authors rather than to give facts, although the authors 
quoted may or may not have known a reason for what they wrote. 

After citing from Lacombe’s Cree Grammar an analysis of a 
nominal compound-stem, Dr. Brinton remarks, in referring to the 
constitutive elements thus found : 

“Not a single one of the above elements can be employed as an inde¬ 
pendent word. They are all only the raw material to weave into and 
make up words.’’ 



400 THE AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST. [Vol. VI. 

And, from Father Montoya’s Tesoro de la Lengua Guarani , he 
adopts the following remarkable statement: 

“The foundation of this language consists of particles, which fre¬ 
quently have no meaning if taken alone ; but when compounded with the 
whole or parts of others (for they cut them up a great deal in composi¬ 
tion) they form significant expressions ; for this reason there are no inde¬ 
pendent verbs in the language, as they are built up of these particles 
with nouns and pronouns.” 

Then Dr. Brinton says : 

“This analysis, which Montoya carries much further, reminds us for¬ 
cibly of the extraordinarily acute analysis of the Cree (Algonkin) by Mr. 
James Howse. Undoubtedly the two tongues have been built up from 
significant particles (not words) in the same manner.” * 

This species of “extraordinarily acute analysis” amounts virtu¬ 
ally to this, that it finds in certain languages “significant expres¬ 
sions,” formed by compounding together certain meaningless par¬ 
ticles with fragments of other equally meaningless particles, and 
this, it is claimed, is the method of word-forming pervading the 
Indian languages. This is romance and not comparative grammar. 
Words can be modified by other words only. Relations of ideas 
must necessarily be indicated by words which, by the tropic action 
of metaphor, will eventually be formatives and flexions. 

Abandoning his first but truer impressions of these Indian tongues, 
expressed ten or twelve years earlier in his report, Duponceau, in 
his Memoire, adopts the fallacious doctrine since called holophrasis. 
Here (p. 249) he says : 

“The grammatic forms of these languages are in perfect harmony 
with the method in which they form their words ; the same system 
rules everywhere ; and everywhere one sees the absence of the spirit of 
analysis. We had believed at one time that analysis should precede 
synthesis ; but more profound researches and deeper reflections have con¬ 
vinced us that the synthetic forms that characterize these idioms result 
from the inability of those who formed them to analyze the concrete 
ideas which presented themselves to their imagination, and they have 
sought to express them en masse , as they have perceived them.” 

This, in short, is the foundation of Dr. Lieber’s doctrine of holo¬ 
phrasis and adopted by Dr. Brinton. It is due wholly to a con¬ 
founding of the analytic mode of expression with mental analysis. 


*p. 82 . 



Oct. 1893 ] POLYSYNTHESIS IN INDIAN LANGUAGES. 


401 


In arguing from a theoretic standpoint against the doctrine of a 
primitive oligo- or monosyllabic stage of development in the Indo- 
European family of languages, the late M. Renan follows the same 
line of argument that Dr. Lieber adopted in support of holophrasis. 
M. Renan says (Origin of Language, seventh chapter) : 

“Another characteristic which the progress of comparative philology 
authorizes us to attribute to primitive language, as in general to crea¬ 
tions of the primitive human mind, is the synthesis and exuberance of its 
forms. It is too often imagined that simplicity, which, relative to our 
analytic processes is anterior to complexity, is also anterior in the order 
of time. This is a vestige of the old usages of the scholastics and of the 
artificial method which logicians employ in psychology. * * * Far 
from this beginning by analysis, the first act which it (the mind) proposes 
is, on the contrary, complex, obscure, synthetic ; all is heaped together 
and indistinct. * * * The idea is expressed at first with its entire 
cortege of determinatives and in a perfect unity. * * * 

“ The history of different systems of conjugation gives place for analo¬ 
gous considerations. I11 our modern languages the subject, the verb, and 
the several relations of time, mode, and voice, are expressed by isolated 
and independent words. In ancient languages, on the contrary, these 
ideas are most often comprised in one single word ; cimabor contains the 
idea of to love , the indication of the first person, that of the future, and 
that of the passive. * * * 

“Agglutination must have been the dominant process of the language 
of primitive men, as synthesis, or rather syncretism, was the characteristic 
of their thought.” 

The criticism of these views by the distinguished linguist, Prof. 
W. D. Whitney, is cogent and effective; and since the argument of 
Professor Whitney embodies the writer’s views on the subject of 
holophrasis as defined by Dr. Lieber, it will be given here entire. 
Professor Whitney says: 

“The synthetic forms which we are asked to regard as original have 
not the character of something indistinctly heaped together ; they con¬ 
tain the clear and express designation of the radical idea and of its im¬ 
portant relations ; they represent by a linguistic synthesis the results of 
a mental analysis. The idea is, indeed, conceived in unity, involving all 
its aspects and relations ; but these cannot be separately expressed until 
the mind has separated them, until practice in the use of language has 
enabled it to distinguish them, and to mark each by an appropriate sign. 
In amabor , the (Latin) word cited as an example of synthesis, are con¬ 
tained precisely the same designations as in the equivalent English 
analytic phrase, “I shall be loved;” ama expresses “loving;” bo 
unites future-sign and ending designating the first person ; and the r is 


402 


THE AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST. 


[Vol. VI 


the sign of passivity. Who can possibly maintain that a system of such 
forms, gathered about a root, exhibits the results of experience, of de¬ 
veloped acuteness, in thought and speech, any less clearly than the 
analytic forms of our English conjugation ? The two are only different 
methods of expressing the same ‘array of determinatives.’ The first 
synthetic mental act, on the contrary, is truly represented by the bare 
root: There all is, indeed, confused and indiscrete. . . M. Renan, in 

short, has made a very strange confusion of analytic style of expression 
with mental analysis: All expression of relations, whether by means that 
we call synthetic or analytic, is the result and evidence of analysis.” * 

This reasoning thoroughly dissipates the position taken by Dr. 
Lieber in support of the doctrine of holophrasis. Although written 
in view of the languages of the Indo-European family, it applies 
with equal force to the languages of the American aborigines, the 
word-sentences of which are the same in kind with those of the 
former. 

The comparison of linguistic forms to ascertain probable lin¬ 
guistic affinity can be used with extreme caution and to a limited 
extent only. The information and data for such a study must be 
accurate and trustworthy in an unexceptional degree; even then 
its results must, in a measure, be necessarily of doubtful value, since 
the scientific method of the science of language demands that no 
human nature different from the one we know be made a factor in 
the problem, and the human organism, under like conditions, acts 
with more or less uniformity. 

Linguistic classification by means of morphologies—grammatic 
and syntactic accordances alone, like that by the genetic method— 
the historically traceable identity of elements—is, of course, incom¬ 
petent and of no force to affirm or to deny identity or possible cor¬ 
respondences among the ultimate elements of some or all linguistic 
groups—accordances antedating all, even partial, grammatic devel¬ 
opment, because its right to be rests on the development of the 
parts of speech and their flexions—the derivative and the syntactic 
processes; beyond these, the tokens of the grammatic period, it 
cannot take us. This is of course true, because in every language 
the earliest records of men can carry us back only to a point far 
distant from the genesis of its peculiar structure and still more dis¬ 
tant from the beginnings of human speech. 


Op, cit., pp. 285, 286. 



Oct. 1893.] POLYSYNTHESIS IN INDIAN LANGUAGES. 


403 


The foregoing paper was read before the Anthropological Society 
of Washington. In the discussion which ensued the following re¬ 
marks were made by Rev. J. Owen Dorsey: 

Several weeks ago Mr. Hewitt requested me to examine the as¬ 
sertions of Duponceau and others which have been criticised to¬ 
night, in order to ascertain whether those statements agreed with 
what I had found in the languages of the Siouan and Athapascan 
families. In consequence of this examination I have been forced 
to the conclusion that the assertions of Duponceau and others re¬ 
specting the structure of Indian languages should be modified, so 
far as the Siouan and Athapascan languages are concerned. A few 
examples, out of many that I can furnish, must suffice at present, 
but I think that they will show the justice of my conclusion. 

On page 117 of Duponceau’s Memoire it is said: 

“Cliacun fait uu mot a sa maniere, qu’il accompagne de signes, et 
qu’ou enteud en partie par intuition.” 

I have yet to find an Indian tribe to which this applies. It is not 
true that among the Siouan tribes, for instance, spoken language is 
invariably accompanied by gestures, though signs are made now and 
then, just as they are made by Frenchmen or Italians in their con¬ 
versation. Many a.time has an Indian crier gone around the vil¬ 
lage on a dark night, when no gestures could be seen, and yet his 
words have been understood by the people. No Siouan Indian 
could “ make a word in his own way; ” he had to conform to fixed 
laws, else his speech could not be understood. 

On page 118 the same writer observes: 

“Out ils Voulu, par exemple, donuer uu uom a uu certaiu arbre, ils 
u’out pas pens£ a le designer simplement par le fruit, ou par quelque 
autre apparence unique ; mais ils ont dit; Varbre portant tel fruit et dout 
les feuilles ressembleut a telle chose.” 

No Siouan Indian speaks thus of any of the flora of his land. Of 
specific tree names in the Biloxi language I have recorded over 
two dozen, and only in three does the word for tree appear as part 
of the name, and in each of these three the compound ends with 
udi , trunk or stock. This last word has its equivalent in the tree 
names of the other Siouan languages. In Dakota, choke-cherries 
are chanpa , and choke-cherry bushes chanpa-hu. A plum tree is 
kanta-hu in Dakota (from kanta , plum, and hu , trunk or stock), and 
kande-h'i (from kande , plum, and hi, trunk or stock), in Dhegiha 


404 THE AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST. [Vol. VI. 

Many other tree names could be given, in most of which the name 
is formed by the simple juxtaposition of the elements. The alleged 
expression of case by the inflection of verbs governing nouns does 
not exist in Siouan languages, unless it applies to the instrumental 
form of the verb (as man iui, he was wounded with or by an arrow: 
man , arrow; i-, instrumental prefix to the verb; u, to wound), 
which sometimes has a locative force, as in dhie dhan iui , he was 
wounded in the side. On the contrary, in the Biloxi, the nomina¬ 
tive and objective signs are suffixed to nouns and pronouns, instead 
of being attached to the governing verb. There are no instances 
of the “particular plural” in the languages which I have recorded, 
although the dual often appears in the verb and some other parts of 
speech. In Dakota, Dhegiha, etc., there is a first person dual in 
the verb; in the Tutu and cognate Athapascan languages of Oregon, 
the verb has a dual in all three persons, and so has the pronoun. 
Duponceau speaks of “a new concordance of tense of the conjunc¬ 
tion with the verb.” This does not appear in Siouan languages. 

A single Cree compound is given as an example of polysynthesis 
in nouns, and this word is declared by so high an authority as Dr. 
D. G. Brinton to be a fair example. We should not be content 
with a single example, especially when that word (the name for 
cross) seems to be a modern word, introduced after the arrival of 
the missionaries. Just here let me quote Dr. Brinton. On page 21 
of his article on Polysynthesis and Incorporation he says: 

“ While the genius of American languages is such that they permit 
and many of them favor the formation of long compounds which express 
the whole of the sentence in one word, this is by no means necessary. 
Most of the examples of words of ten, twenty or more syllables are not 
genuine native words, but novelties manufactured by the missionaries.” 

I know by experience how difficult it is for a missionary to con¬ 
vey to the minds of his hearers certain religious ideas. Again and 
again did I try when missionary to the Ponka Indians to find the 
proper Indian word for kingdom , in order to make even an approx¬ 
imate translation of the petition, “Thy kingdom come.” The Cree 
word for cross (if it be, as I suspect, a modern word) is as poor an 
illustration of what the author contemplated as is the Mexican name 
for goat given by Dr. Whitney on page 348 of his work entitled 
“ Language and the Study of Language,” as there is no species of 
goat indigenous to the Western hemisphere. Any one who has 
lived among Indians knows the worthlessness of adducing modern 


Oct. 1893.] POLYSYNTHESIS IN INDIAN LANGUAGES. 


405 


names ( 7 . e., names of objects introduced among the Indians since 
the arrival of the white race on this continent) for the purpose of 
illustrating the structure of an Indian language. As far as I can 
judge from such illustrations of polysynthesis in nouns, no such pro¬ 
cess occurs in the Siouan languages, nor can I recall any instance 
of it in the Athapascan languages of Oregon. 

Dr. Brinton refers to “generic formatives,” by which, I suppose, 
he means classifiers. These classifiers are found in the Athapascan 
and Siouan languages, and they perform several functions: some¬ 
times they indicate to what classes objects belong (the sitting, stand¬ 
ing, reclining, etc., of the Athapascan and Siouan; the earthy, 
mushy, watery, stony, etc., of other languages); sometimes they 
distinguish between the subject and the object of an action, etc. 
Numeral terminations, indicating the nature of the objects counted, 
are unknown in the Siouan languages; but in the Athapascan lan¬ 
guages of Oregon there are two series of numerals, the human and 
the non-human. 

We are told that polysynthesis is a characteristic which distin¬ 
guishes American Indian languages from those of the old world. Is 
there nothing of the nature of so-called polysynthesis in the Aryan 
languages? In Greek, dstaidai/ACDv is explained by 6 too? dat/xovas 
dtzi(ja$\ bvt/atpi/cafcas by 6 to?? fca/co't 9 ’ejttyaipwv ) Ka/codai/xcov by'o 
/ca/cdv dalfiova ey(ov ; evOeos by 'o rov dsov ’ev iaurw eywv (Klihner, 
Greek Gr., New York, 1864, p. 296). The Sanscrit was especially 
distinguished by its power of forming compounds of any length, 
and one of the greatest difficulties of the language lies in the finding 
out the exact relation of the different parts. Thus, a Hindu could 
speak of a man as being “ tiger-king-hand-sword-killed ” (a very 
moderate compound). This would mean “killed by a sword in 
the hand of a king who was like a tiger.”* 

On pages 16 and 17 of the article on polysynthesis and incorpora¬ 
tion Dr. Brinton says: 

“As the holophrastic method makes no provisions for the syntax of the 
sentence outside the expression of action (7 e., the verbal and what it 
embraces), nouns and adjectives are not declined. The ‘cases’ which 
appear in many grammars of American languages are usually indications 
of space or direction or of possession and not case-endings in the sense of 
Aryan grammar.” 


* Peile, Philology, N. Y.. 1877, pp. 77. 78. 




406 


THE AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST. 


[Vol. VI. 


What are case-endings in the sense of Aryan grammar? Kiihner 
informs us that “all the relations which the Greek denotes by the 
genitive, dative, and accusative were originally considered relations 
of space." * The relations of time and causality also were regarded 
as relations of space. Whitney remarks that out of the seven cases 
“three of them distinctly indicated local relations: the ablative 
denoted the relation expressed by from ; the locative that expressed 
by in; the instrumental that expressed by with or by" f To these 
Peile adds the dative, denoting the relation expressed by to or 
towards.\ Can any one explain away these words of Kiihner, 
Whitney, and Peile ? 

The learned author of “Polysynthesis and Incorporation” in¬ 
forms us that “a further consequence of the same method” (i. e. y 
his method of polysynthesis) “ is the absence of true relative pro¬ 
nouns, of copulative conjunctions, and generally of the machinery 
of dependent clauses.” In Siouan languages there are copulative 
conjunctions. That there are words which perform the functions of 
relative pronouns may be seen from the following sentences: 

Mazhan dhan ankikandhai te andhia tangatan ebdhegan—I 

Land the we desire for the we fail we shall I think 
ourselves (which) 

think that we shall fail to obtain the land which we desire for our¬ 
selves. 

Nuzhinga dhii dhinke e azhi ha. Panka azhi 

Boy gave it he who that one another . Ponka another 

to you (aforesaid) 

shange tan ihan tan adhin aka e gdhizai 

horse the his the has he who that one took 

standing mother standing (subject) (aforesaid) his own 

shangetazhinga—The youth who gave it to you is not the one (who 

colt 

now has the stray colt). He who has taken it is the Ponka who 
has the colt’s mother. 

Unless one has before him one or more series of sentences, such 
as occur in myths or epistles, he is hardly in the position to speak 
with authority, at least so far as dependent clauses are concerned.§ 

* Op. cit., p. 373. 

f Op. cit., pp. 271, 272. 

I Op. cit., pp. 102-106. * 1 

gFor examples of dependent clauses in the Siouan languages see my Madison 
address, “The Biloxi Indians of Louisiana,” p. 16, and “ Contributions to North Ameri¬ 
can ethnology,” vol. 6, pp. 582, 585, etpassim. 



Oct. 1893.] POLYSYNTIIESIS IN INDIAN LANGUAGES. 


407 


On page 16 Dr. Brinton says that “ the subject is usually a pro¬ 
noun inseparably connected or, at least, included within the tense 
sign,” and in the same paragraph he speaks of the tense sign pre¬ 
ceding the subject. This cannot apply to Siouan languages. In 
those languages the tense sign, when any is used, follows the sub¬ 
ject, and is usually near the end of the clause or sentence. 

An-wan-khpa-ni , “I am poor,” in Dhegiha cannot be “My 
being poor,” as the pronominal fragment is anwan, which is objec¬ 
tive, as shown by the vowel a, whereas the possessive and dative of 
the first person would have the vowel t. 


“La Mensuration du Cou.” —In Tome VI, No. 10, 1893, of 
Melusine, there is an interesting article, the joint production of 
MM. Gaidoz and Perdrizet, on the size of the neck as an index 
of nubility and virginity in both male and female persons in the 
popular beliefs current among various folk. Citations are given 
from various authors, among others, C. Valerius Catullus, Vossius, 
Scaliger, Ellis, describing the custom of measuring the neck. The 
question was discussed in 1888 by the “Societe d’Anthropologie de 
Paris,” and the discussion was published in the Bulletin de la Societe 
dl Anthropologie de Paris, 4th series, Tome XI (1888), pp. 459 et 472. 
The following quotation from the article will show its nature: 
“Aiez une eguillee de fil blanc, mesurez avec ce fil la grosseur du 
cou de la fille, puis vous doublerez cette mesure, et vous en ferez 
tenir les deux bouts a la fille avec ses dents, et vous etendrez ladite 
mesure pour faire passer sa tete; si la tdte passe trop aisement, elle 
est corrompue; si elle ne passe qu’a peine, assurez-vous qu’elle est 
pucelle.’ * Secrets merveilleux de la magie nature lie et cabalistique du 
Petit Albert, etc., 1743, 21 p. Among the Kabyles the puberty of 
young men is determined solemnly in this manner, according to the 
excellent work of MM. Honoteau and Letourneau, “ La Kabylie.” 

J. N. B. Hewitt. 
















LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 


0 029 037 435*2 













